The precise definition of twinking varies depending on the variety of role-playing game: A related term, smurfing also exists.
[7] Often used in video gaming, smurfing describes a situation in which "a highly-skilled player creates a secondary account as a disguise to play against less proficient opponents.
"[8] The term originates from two Warcraft II players employing the strategy under the names "Papa Smurf" and "Smurfette".
Twinking was once very common in the CORPG Guild Wars, when players would have their low-level characters taken by high-level characters to end-game areas to obtain the best armor, weapons, and skills available (different terms are used to describe this action: being "carried through", "Pushed through", "boosted", "getting a boost"), as Guild Wars does not have a level limit on such things.
This practice became so common that the Guild Wars development team introduced a patch prohibiting characters with high-level armor entering beginner arenas.
In addition to heirlooms, World of Warcraft also includes an option whereby a character may pay 10 gold to disable experience-gain and thereby maintain a specific level.
By competing at the highest level allowed in the battleground bracket, and equipped with the best possible gear, twinks played with a significant advantage over regular players.
Because of the gear and/or experience advantage, twinks often easily overpowered new and low-level players, quickly eliminating them from play.
In other online RPGs, such as Dark Souls, twinking can be done through a few methods, including gaining the help of other players who are at a higher level in order to have them clear content before it should be accessible, memorizing the locations of particular powerful items, and utilizing very specific strategies to advance further in the storyline than should otherwise be possible.
This is done in Borderlands through a storage container located in the game's central hub, allowing up to four items to be stored and retrieved by any of the player's characters.
This parallels MMORPGs, where in-game money is a strong limiting factor in the virtual economy and gear is usually in the form of clothing and jewelry.